bemol Ardiente

Something happened this week. It's worth mentioning that a social media guru that I follow (Kristen Lamb) has warned writers against posting about politics, unless they specifically want to be political writers. Her reasoning is sound – if you want to be known as a mystery writer, then that's the sort of image you should be developing for yourself. It's about branding and what people thing about when they see your name. Do they think about interesting places and intriguing thoughts, or political rants? So, I try to restrain myself. But something happened this week. To me it seems like something huge; it feels huge. I am glued to the radio and I find that I can't sleep at night.

My younger brother, who lives and breathes politics, seems to treat it as insignificant – something to laugh about, and an opportunity to be amused by the people who are upset about it. I try to temper my response, to measure myself against him to make sure I'm not overreacting.

I'm not good at politics.

I am usually good at writing. But, when my brain is consumed by something like this, I find it difficult. The President of the United States fired the director of the FBI, James Comey, as Comey was in the middle of an investigation into Russian meddling in our 2016 presidential election, as well as possible collusion with the president's campaign. Reasons have been put forward and then contradicted, and it all feels very much like the original Watergate investigation. This is not small, and thanks to social media I can get updates as they happen, which is all day every day. I don't want to, but I can't stop looking at this train wreck.

I try to do other things. I listen to my own music, but I get emails on my phone from news outlets and I can't bring myself to turn them off. I tried listening to the Sam's New Thing podcast, hosted by Sam Sanders of NPR (one of the original co-hosts of the NPR Politics podcast.) I thought it was supposed to be about art, culture, music and other interesting things, but even in this forum he and his friends discussed this topic for the first half of the show.

I can't seem to get away from it. I am unable to write, or to read or to paint or draw. I am unable to do the things that could help me cope with this uneasiness. Also, it leaves me to wonder what I would be writing for. If I published one of my usual blog posts, it would be drowned by everything going on with the FBI issue. If I can't concentrate enough to even read a novel, would everybody else be as consumed?